


Depths of the Shadows Around Us

by grnidshrk



Series: Shade's in the Grey: A Wolf's Howl [2]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Dark, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Shade Verse, Animal Transformation, F/M, Gen, Multi, Other, Psychopomp AU, Underage Sex, Underage Smoking
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-05-11
Updated: 2014-06-05
Packaged: 2017-12-11 11:47:57
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Underage
Chapters: 5
Words: 8,950
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/798419
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/grnidshrk/pseuds/grnidshrk
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Stiles has a secret from the Pack; one only Scott and his Dad know of. He and his Mom, well they weren't just close because he was a 'momma's boy' as Jackson used to call him.</p><p>He and his Mom had always been a lot closer to Death than they ever had been to life, then again a person usually is when your three times Great-Grandmother was <i>Death</i> itself.</p><p>They're a Myth among myths, beings who've always stuck to the darkest of shadows.</p><p>Now, he's being pulled out into some of the lighter ones by the Pack and he's not exactly looking forward to the repercussions from it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Silver Wisps

Stiles has never been a normal human.

Hell, half the time he's not even sure his kind are classified as human. But what he is—and what his mother was—doesn't keep him from having the same problems as normal humans. He's random, his thoughts jump around because of his ADHD, and he still gets the occasional pimple or sick just like a normal person. It does affect his personality and habits a little bit. Stiles is more of a night person and more solitary in nature than most. He's more conscience about his personal hygiene than Scott has ever been and he tends to take naps in the forest—up in the trees. But the effects the non-human part of his mind have on him are negligible compared to what being a werewolf has done to Scott's personality. Of course he's been what he is all his life, who knows what he'd be like without this part of himself.

It's something Scott has known since they were eight and Scott stole Stiles' Batman action figure. Stiles jumped him, not as a little boy, but as a feline about the size of a house cat. Dark spots ringed in black covered larges swatches of his back, eyes gold and grey as he locked his jaw around Scott's sleeve and pulled and growled until he dropped the doll. Explaining what he and his mother were to Scott and Ms. McCall was a lot harder than he'd ever thought it would be. He is ferociously glad his mother was there to help him explain it. Finding a way to explain after she had passed, not more than two months later, would have been near impossible.

How do you explain you can see the dead? Move and live and speak with them like they are alive? How do you say that if you wanted to you could leave this world behind?

None of the born wolves, Peter and Derek, have commented on his scent. Scott said that the cloud of Adderall that hangs around him probably covers whatever might make him smell something other than a human and really, Stiles doesn't want to test that theory. He doesn't know how in the living world he'd explain it without his mother there—she'd always been so much better with people and knew how to explain this without being confusing—and he doesn't want to be thrown against a wall and questioned about why he's never used his abilities to help them with the Argents and Peter while he was the Alpha. 

His abilities are for the dead and the dead only. Or at least that's how he's interpreted it.

After Peter's death and Laura was reburied, human now without the wolf's bane circle, Stiles was finally able to meet the woman whose death had led to Derek's return and Scott's change. Talking with her is eye opening. He can’t help but feeling alternately guilty and envious. Guilty that they’d accused Derek of her murder and envious that Derek has—had—a sister like Laura. 

Learning how an Alpha is supposed teach a new wolf and how to help Scott is really useful. Learning how Derek reacted towards the loss of their family and his belief that he was the cause of it is illuminating. And these are just a few things she's told Stiles. Trying to figure out a discrete way to tell Derek the things Laura has taught Stiles is even harder than not telling him that Laura is fine and that she wants him to stop vilifying himself for the death of their family.

Stiles doesn't know how much longer he can keep this up.

________________________________________

They'd had to split up. 

There were seven hunters. Each one experienced and each with wolf's bane ammunition—none of them following the Code. Stiles doesn't know how he got grouped with the pups of the Pack but he knows that Peter is with Scott and Allison and Derek is with Lydia, Jackson, and Danny. It feels like Boyd, Erica and, Isaac are his responsibility; they're so new and even though they think he's just plain _human_ Stiles, he knows more about this than they do even if he's fumbling and tripping on roots as he struggles to keep up with them as they run from the pair chasing them.

A bullet grazes Isaac's calf causing him to miss a rock and he's down. 

Boyd is pulling Isaac up when Stiles hears the snap of a stick, the pups' eyes shining as they swivel towards the sound, and he launches himself forward. Stiles can't hold back the yowl as he pushes Erica out of the path of a bullet that grazes his side instead. It certainly wasn't intentional and the sound causes Boyd and Isaac to turn and stare at him. Stiles twists his body around and falls into a crouch, balanced on the balls of his feet and the pads of his fingers in a way that he knows is completely inhuman.

He doesn't even think as he lets the otherness that's always pushing at his skin and mind out. His eyes become luminous in the low light of the night and it's half moon; his lips curl up in a snarl and his eye teeth extend down longer than any of the werewolves. He can feel the blood from his wound slowly staunch itself as his body knits itself back together with silver wisps of the Grey. The aconite from the bullet doesn't affect him in the least and he knows it's confusing the hunters that have been chasing them. The low growl that reverberates through his chest is higher than the wolves' and it turns into a threatening hiss as the predator part of him assesses the humans and their weapons.

Stiles' teeth are perfect for severing arteries and his balance in this form—unlike his fully human form—is nigh on incomparable. With a well-timed leap he takes the female hunter down quick and into the Fade. His jaws tear through her throat but she doesn't even last long enough to finish bleeding out, the natural order of the Fade, where the living don't exist, works to restore itself and kills her first. With a harried glance through the Grey to the Living world he checks on the others before making sure the female hunter can't hurt anyone among the dead either. The male of the hunter duo has a shotgun leveled at Erica, finger tightening on the trigger. Without missing a beat, Stiles is back amongst the Living and buries one open clawed hand deep in his gut, nails scrapping the man's vertebrae. There's a gurgle of blood wet breath as he crumples to the ground. A grotesque squelching noise echoes out as Stiles' hand leave his body.

Stiles isn't even breathing heavily despite having taken down two trained hunters in the span seconds. His adrenaline is through the roof, he's coated in blood, and his eyes are still shining eerily in the moonlight but he doesn't move, still staring at the empty eyes of the man and ignoring the other three behind him. He didn't want them to know. They watched as their _'human'_ Stiles Stilinski got shot and shook it off. They watched as he moved like them and then disappeared. Heard him yowl and hiss before he took the hunters down. They watched him be vicious in a way none of them had ever thought him capable of. This was a side of him he never wanted the Pack to know. 

It was bad enough Scott knew he often felt more comfortable with the Dead than the Living. This part of him was for the eyes of the Dead only and now the secret was out. 

It doesn't even cost him a thought to move into the Fade. It's only as an afterthought that he pulls the other body along with him before falling to the ground. He closes his eyes and tries to breathe deep. His head and hands are hanging between his knees trying to push away the panic attack and the sudden cacophony of thoughts. When he's sure he isn't going to lose it he opens his eyes and both of the dead bodies greet him. He slams them shut as quickly as he can and rubs the heels of his palms into them and grimacing at the blood now on his face before standing up, ignoring the corpses, and looking through the Grey that separates the worlds for the other three.

Boyd is peering at the pool of blood left behind and trying to pin point where he's gone. Stiles can't withhold the hysterical laugh that bubbles out as Erica—strong, always strong, Erica—walks over, shaking and wide-eyed, with Isaac's hand tightly clutched in her own as he limps beside her. The three are quiet as Boyd scents the air, a low whimper coming from Isaac's throat in distress when the stoic teen frowns after finding nothing. Erica stiffens, her eyes becoming determined and angered as she beats down the fright she'd been feeling since she almost got hit, "Stiles!"

Her voice rings through the clearing, bouncing off the trees in the silence, "Damnit Stiles! Get your ass out here!"

"Stiles?" Isaac's voice is quieter and filled with pain.

He doesn't answer them. They're still in shock but without an answer or inkling to where Stiles has gone it doesn't take them long to decide to find the rest of the Pack and Derek, moving as quickly as possible with Isaac injured between them. 

With a sigh and a grimace he completely shifts into his Clouded Leopard form and follows them as they regroup and move toward the shell that used to be the Hale home, hoping the others are there and safe. Stiles is in the trees, paws quick and swift as he leaps from branch to branch, his tail a counter balance. Blood mats his fur but he really doesn't care, he just wants them safe so he can go home and figure out what to feel about killing his first people. He needs to figure out how to explain what just happened.

He hopes Scott doesn't say anything before he can figure out what to say.


	2. Ace

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Stiles needed someone to talk to, some advice, _something_ to help him figure out what the fuck to do now that he's outed himself as more than normal.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Anything described, food or smoke or otherwise _**IS**_ poisonous, do not try them. You will die or be extremely ill.

Beacon Hills was in one of the sparser areas of the forest it was in, in fact the forest got thicker the farther from town it got. When heading towards the coast the next town you hit was Fort Bragg, which was a short trip when you knew what roads or trails to take.

Luckily Goibniu Daedalus "Stiles" Stilinski knew the way by heart both on foot and by road.

The drive twenty minute drive to his cousin Annalise's restaurant, The Reef, was short but a welcome comfort as he let the cool air rush through the open window. The rumbling growl of his baby soothed away his jagged edges and softened the tension that had built up in his shoulders from the run in with the hunters two nights before. He's been avoiding everyone since, everyone but Scott and his Dad, and he still hasn't figured out what to say but he hopes working and talking Anna will at least help him figure out something.

Scott and his Dad are, of course, the only people in his life that know he has a job. 

It isn't that he keeps it a secret; most people just ignore him, even the Pack. Part of him is still surprised no one has noticed he's been the one supplying them with food and the everyday necessities a home, _pack den_ , needs. A small part, a very small part he doesn't like to admit he has, whispers in the back of his mind that he could be saving so much more of his money if he just stopped catering to the oblivious wolves. 

He beats that voice into submission each time; he's always taken care of _his pride_ (Dad, Scott, Mrs. McCall, and now Derek and the Pups) even if most of them are obliviously ungrateful. (Should he call them that? There is no proof after all, that his type of Feline develop prides.) 

He's glad to have this job, glad his cousin lets him work here despite his tendency to gab with the customers too much or be a klutz. The ability to move between the Living and the Dead, though, makes him a more valuable employee because he can work in the same restaurant in both worlds. 

Pulling into his favorite space beneath the old redwood that overshadows the whole place, he can't help but release a heavy sigh and scrub heavily at his face and hair before turning off the engine. With a little difficulty he pushes away the darker thoughts and pulls his focus onto his job.

"Hey Ace," is the first thing Stiles hears as he walks into the back, Annalise grabbing an order. "You have a few tables in your section already." 

He smiles at her with a 'hey' of his own and gets to work. Chatting with his regulars and getting their orders, Annalise and some his coworkers throwing jokes and comments back and forth with him, helps drain more of his stress. He flips between the two worlds with ease, never forgetting which customers are where, their orders or the conversations he's had with them. It's one of the few things that make him grateful for his overactive brain. He forgets to hold back some of the things that makes him _just_ human at some point and the natural feline grace that he's always held back just adds to his ease. 

He's good at this, good for more than comic relief and research and sarcasm. He just wishes the Pack and everyone involved with it treated him as something as more than a nuisance.

It when Stiles is on his first break of the evening, lounging lethargically on the hood of his Jeep, propped up against the windshield, that life outside of The Reef comes crashing back. 

He's smoking a new blend he got for his midwakh—his mother's pipe; it's beautiful in its simplicity, made of bone and dark walnut, with carved swirls painted black on the bone bowl. Smoking isn't a habit he advertizes he has, his dad would probably flay him alive if he's caught but he's not home and no one but the patrons know him. As it is, he has to appreciate the flavors this new blend has to offer, it doesn't have monkshood in it due to Scott's sudden transformation into a werewolf. Instead it has foxglove, snakeroot, and clove mixed with the usual tobacco, they give the smoke a bittersweet flavor that he enjoys while it slows his heart rate and his thoughts. The monkshood had always left him feeling a little fuzzy and loopy; this one just seems to calm him.

During a long slow draw from the pipe that he opens his eyes to blow smoke rings and notices Chris Argent standing in front of his Jeep. He can't help but glance at his phone to see he has less than ten minutes left and can't contain a sigh.

He nods to the hunter in greeting. "Hello Mr. Argent, how can I help you in the next. . ." he glances back at his phone, "eight minutes before my break is over?" 

Electric blue eyes study him for a beat. "Does the Sheriff know you smoke?" 

The desire to flash his eyes at the man is strong but Stiles holds it in—barely. "It's my mother's pipe," is all he says and he pleased to know the man is finding his sudden taciturn manner unsettling.

The hunter shoves his hands in his pockets as he studies Stiles more closely, his voice soft when he speaks. "I see. I had forgotten. She's been gone for six years now, yes?" 

Stiles bares his all too human teeth at Argent in a dark facsimile of a grin causing the man to tense. "Seven, actually. She's been gone for seven years. Dad said I was allowed to use it when I was eighteen or if I could find a legitimate reason to. I learned that I could slow my thoughts and focus better when smoking specific herbs, better than the Adderall. He let me start smoking right before high school." 

Blue eyes narrowed at the sneer in Stiles' voice. "I suppose so. I really just wanted to ask you why. Why do you protect Hale? Scott, I understand, you've known him a good portion of your life, but Hale? He's done nothing but bring you trouble, especially for you and your father."

Stiles relaxed against his jeep when he realized the hunter had no knowledge of what he'd done the other night, that he was as much an animal as the wolves the Argent family hunted, and took another long pull of his pipe. Looking out into the darkened forest, he stayed quite for a minute before he spoke. "Your family, not you or Allison but others, have persecuted his family, by blood and bite, and caused him constant grief. A torment that hangs over his head for which he blames himself. He's . . ." 

Stiles couldn't help but pause again as he thought about what he was about to do. "He's a fellow shifter, though from a completely different origin than me." 

He let his eyes glow in the low lighting outside the bar as he locked eyes with the older man.

Argent froze in shock, his eyes widening.

"Stiles." Both men turned to look at Annalise. "Your break is over." 

Stiles nodded and glanced between the two before heading inside, leaning against the wall to the right of the door to listen. Annalise moved even with Argent and pulled out her own box of smokes. She leaned against the Jeep and lit one of the black cigarettes. 

She looked him in the eye and watched Argent, her eyes flowing to black as his hand drifted toward his firearm. "Our type of shifting is greatly different from that of a were's, Mr. Argent. We cannot be bitten and changed—we are just born. Ours is a form of protection—a gift from the forebearer of all of our lines." 

Argent's eyebrows furrowed in confusion, "The forebearer of all of your lines?" 

She nodded in assent, "Yes, there is only one being that started all of our family lines. One being, though a different form with each of us." 

Now he was actually frowning, "I don't understand." 

She sighed, the smoke leaving her lungs and curling like writhing snakes in the air. "Libreis Mors Mortis is the old Latin name for us—Children of Death; Death is the sire for each of our families. We are Death's children, and we all have the ability to not only see and speak to the departed, but to cross over ourselves, depending on the individual's strength. While Death is a constant, Death also always changes; sometimes Death is a woman, sometimes Death is a man, a crow, a snake, an animal of some kind. That ability has given each of us the ability to change into another singular form. Our abilities are to be used to help Death." 

"Though just as there are good and bad humans," her eyes met Argent's again, hers once more a piercing green. "And good and bad Werewolves, there are good and bad Shades."

Chris Argent had read of them, the Liberis Mors Mortis, but everything he'd read and heard about them had stated that they were a myth—not in the way a werewolf was a myth, but a myth amoungst myths. Learning that they were real had pulled the metaphorical rug from beneath his feet. 

"Stiles' mother, he still sees her?" 

The question breeds a sorrowful gaze, "No, Aunt Terpsichore has passed beyond where we can go. Whether or not that is reincarnation, heaven, or hell, none of us knows. She fought one of us—a rogue. She won, but his poison was too much for her body to combat and she died about two months later."

Chris Argent looked at the young woman. He'd been surprised to see one of the kids involved with the local Pack working there. And to learn he and the owner were related. There was definitely something about them, was a look in her eye, similar to the Stilinski boy's, it was older than her age, more tired and worn. He'd thought the current trouble with the wolves had created that ancient look in the boy's eyes, but looking at the woman in front of him he couldn't help but think what it would be like to be aware of Death at such a young age, to try and understand it when the person meant to guide you and raise you through learning about your gifts died far, far too early.

"He's going to keep on protecting them, doing what he can, isn't he?"

The question doesn't surprise her, Chris notices. 

Annalise grinned at him around the cigarette in her mouth before exhaling and flashing fanged version. "Of course. He feels he owes Derek for blaming him for Laura's death in the beginning and now he's the only bridge between the two. He's trying to figure out how to give Derek her advice without tormenting the man with the knowledge that he can see her and talk to her where Derek can't."

Chris couldn't help but suddenly feel outrageously tired as he moved to slump against the old Jeep. "Do all of . . . your kind have such ancient eyes? I feel like I should be trying to protect him from the wolves, like they're the ones causing him to age faster than he should, but . . ."

She looks up at the waning moon, letting out a hissing sigh as she crushes the stub of her smoke beneath the heel of her boot. 

"Yes. I've been told that because of what we are, we see too much. I don't know if that's entirely true but I know we see more than the average person on this plane, that if you compared us to someone who's fully human and has seen too much death or been abused you almost couldn't tell the difference. The truth is, we are exposed to reality far earlier in life than most, even without losing a family member or witnessing death. We see the ones that have gone through it. We've watched as they've healed from what caused their deaths to look like themselves again and noticed when some can't let it go and are constantly haunted by their disfigurements and grief. It leaves its mark, Mr. Argent, but it also makes us stronger and more understanding than you humans."

She turned to stare him in the eye, green flashing to black again and her voice filled with an airy hissing sound, her needle like fangs glinting in the moonlight. "He will protect what he deems his to protect. If one of those wolves steps out of line, you can be sure that he wouldn't stand in your way if you went after them, but seeing as most of them are innocent high school kids? He would probably go against his own rules and tear you—or whoever dared to hurt them—apart. Literally."

Chris Argent looked up at the waning moon as Annalise walked back into the restaurant and left him to his muddled thoughts, trying to sort out all he'd just learned, missing the shadowed forms of Annalise and Stiles hugging each other in the doorway.

Life in Beacon Hills was definitely complicated.


	3. Release

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> People all have their ways of relaxing, of letting the tension seep from their shoulders and their obligations fade away for a little while.
> 
> Danny just never thought Stiles' would relax like this.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Anything described, food or smoke or otherwise _**IS**_ poisonous, do not try them. You will die or be extremely ill.

It's almost two in the morning before Stiles and Annalise are alone together in her restaurant.

Stiles is sitting at the bar nursing a local brew made of California Buckeyes. The brew is toxic to everyone but the dead and Death's Children, so he sits and enjoys it, something he can't have around others.

His thoughts are moving at a rapid pace, making him contemplate smoking again just to settle his thoughts when Annalise sits next to him with her own bottle, done cleaning for the day. 

"You going to tell me what's going through your mind, Ace? You've been quiet and you actually told someone outside of the family about us. What's going on inside that head of yours?" 

Stiles sighed loudly, his shoulders slumping before taking another drink, "There were two hunters, Harley. I killed them." 

"Damn." 

Stiles snorted and gave her a self-depreciating grin, "Yeah, so you can see why I'm so. . . Out of sorts." 

Her eyes flickered between black and green as she watched him, finally settling on black. 

"Were they going to kill you?" 

Stiles' grip tightened on the bottle, his fingers clawed, his eyes no longer brown, and his teeth more fang than blunt and human. 

"It wasn't just me they were chasing, the pups—Erica, Isaac, and Boyd—were with me. I wasn't going to let them be killed. Not when I could do something about it." 

Annalise hissed out a breath before taking a long drink from her own bottle. 

"Death has always been part of our life, Ace." 

"I've never been the direct cause of it before, Harl." 

They sat there together in silence, drinking and as content as either could be with the circumstances, shoulders leaning against each other to comfort themselves. 

Then Annalise spoke, "Let's go." 

"Go where?'' Stiles asked, his face a mask of confusion 

"To San Fran, Teresa and Jean Luc are both there. They opened up the club Teresa always wanted. C'mon, you could use a little clubbing to cheer you up; we haven't been dancing since before you officially became seventeen. You know they love you, hell they add you to them whenever you're around, considering they both feel they have a claim on you." 

Stiles' eyes went unfocused as he looked into the distance, thinking about Teresa and Jean Luc. 

"Well I did lose my virginity to 'Resa and Luc was the one to introduce me to the wonder that is gay sex." 

"See, a claim." 

Stiles' mouth twitched into a jagged predatory grin at the thought of seeing the other two again and what the pack would say about such a claim. 

"Fine, when do we leave and you get to tell my dad."

Annalise just laughed and leapt from her stool, grabbing their empties while she was at it.

Dancing and sex were the best ways to get over too heavy thoughts and her Ace definitely needed to relax.  
\---  
Stiles moved his hips to the music, grinding against the bodies nearest him. 

For the first time in a while he was letting go, letting the feline in him out, all grace and swift enticing movements. Long and lanky, were there should have been awkwardness there was only confidence, a predator dancing among prey. He was grace and sexuality personified.

He was in a pair of tight dark blue jeans, a tight green tank top with a black button up thrown on top of it, a thick leather cuff around his left wrist and a heavy chain around his right. Black eyeliner rimmed his eyes, making his green-gold irises even more striking. His outfit was a complete change from his regular baggy jeans and layered shirts and plaid. Then again, there wasn't a real reason to wear clubbing clothes in Beacon Hills.

Danny almost couldn't believe his eyes when he caught sight of his class mate, hell at first he thought he was seeing things. He'd dragged both Lydia and Jackson out to San Francisco, all three of them staying in his older brother's apartment since he was gone, trying to get their minds off the past two weeks. The hunters attacking them, Stiles avoiding the pack, and school starting soon weighed heavily on their minds so he figured getting them out of town and to a place where they didn't have to worry about Pack business or Stiles' odd behavior was the best thing before school began.

He wasn't expecting to see his classmate moving in ways he'd never hinted at being able to. 

Danny was at the bar, watching over their drinks as he continued staring at his classmate, thrumming with the need to tell both Jackson and Lydia what he was seeing but unwilling to leave their drinks unattended—he was young not stupid—his mouth open and eyes slightly wide in astonished surprise at the sinuous sexuality the other was producing as he curled around women and arched against men around him in almost wild abandon. 

Lydia had just finally made her way back to their spot when Danny noticed one of the bartenders moved to the dance floor. She immediately made her way to Stiles and pushed her back to Stiles' front, his hands curling around her hips and his lips and tongue running along the column of her throat with the familiarity of someone who was more than just a dance partner or friend. The change from oblivious writhing with those around him to focusing all of his moves on the blond bombshell in front of him a more drastic change than his clothes, and Danny had to admit the confidence in Stiles movements were actually turning him on.

For once he was wishing he'd told Stiles that he was indeed attractive to gay guys, just to have that intense attention focused on him.

Lydia's eyes were narrow when he finally felt her nails digging into his forearm like Jackson's claws, causing him swallow a moan in shock of pained pleasure before he looked at her.

"What is it? Do we need to go?"

He couldn't help but almost numbly shake his head. "No," he croaked before clearing his throat, "no, I just, ah, I just learned where Stiles has been hiding is all."

Lydia's eye widened from their squint as her gaze whipped around towards where he'd been staring and spying their classmate dancing even more lewdly with the blond from before and another of the bartenders, a dark haired male, sandwiching him between them.

"Fuck."

Lydia wasn't one prone to cussing, to crude she'd told both him and Jackson several times before, but she often did it in times of trouble or extreme surprise. As it was just hearing the single uttered word was enough for Jackson to almost violently shove the people in his way back from the bathroom, trying to get to his girlfriend and best friend as quickly as possible.

"What, what's going on?" Danny could tell he was on high alert just from the fact that his voice had dropped lower and his pupils had become slitted, ready to tear whatever the threat was to shreds.

"It's all fine, Whittemore. They're just shocked at my cousin's more primal side."

The three turned tense and ready to fight before noticing who'd actually spoke and what they'd said. Annalise stood behind the bar mixing some drinks for one of the waiting waitresses, both watching the three with dark bemusement.

Lydia was the first to comprehend the sentence, her eyes slitted in suspicion "Your cousin?"

"Yeah, you know, Stiles Stilinski, son of the Sheriff and goes to Beacon Hills High School, best friends with Scott McCall. The boy who will describe himself as the sarcastic sidekick to the Beacon Hills Pack and loves to annoy the hell out of your Alpha, Derek Hale? Ring any bells, Miss Martin?"

Before any of them can respond, Stiles' voice breaks through the noise of the club and the bodies around them, "C'mon Harl, leave'em alone, you know they've never seen me like that."

The four looked at him and his classmates were slightly surprised to see him so comfortable with the older male draped so obviously on his shoulders but the blond woman was nowhere to be seen.

The waitress left them with a sultry giggle, pressing a kiss to Stiles' cheek as she left, "Don't terrorize the newbies too much guys, I'd hate to have to confound them."

Stiles' sighed a little, realizing he'd have to finally come clean to his pack, even if only part of it.

"Alright, I know a place near here. C'mon, let's all go get something to eat, my treat."

"Good," comes from behind them all, "'cause I've signed us all out for the night, Amelia's in charge. Let's take the kids and mess with their world views."

Lydia scowled at the blond woman standing behind her but followed when Stiles moved to go with her and the unknown male.

She was going to get her answers and more, whether she wanted it or not.


	4. Expanding Your Horizons

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Getting food turns out to be a lot more serious than everyone thought it would be, but then again how could they learn what they do without it being any different.

San Francisco is a very large city, one very accepting of people's quirks and kinks and everything in between.

This was why it isn't hard for one to find a more . . . Supernaturally inclined diner for them to eat at, especially one so near the club owned by Teresa and Jean Luc, a club with strict rules about letting people in, considering it was for the more abnormal of the populous. Only those who knew about the more shadowed parts of life or were part it could get in; would even _want_ too.

Lydia, Jackson, and Danny followed Stiles, his cousin, and the two he'd been dancing with. They were several steps behind them, watching as the four interacted and moved with each other, the ease between them evident. Stiles was even casually touching them, something they'd only seen Stiles do with Scott when he thought he wasn't being watched; his shoulders weren't hunched and his gait smooth and loose. He wasn't hiding behind masks of lies and sarcasm or random facts and inappropriate questions.

When they walked into Pamela's it wasn't anything the other three expected.

The diner was bright, quaint, and vastly different from the club they'd just been in. Deep purple, white, black, and mint green were the main colors of the establishment. The people already there making Jackson stiffen and growl low in his throat as something about them registered as dangerous. And he probably would have continued to do so if Stiles hadn't locked eyes with him, a teasing grin on his face as his slitted eyes almost sparkled in mirth. His amusement was enough for Jackson to get a hold of himself, not wanting Stiles to get the better of him.

An extremely pale young woman with violet eyes seated them; flashing fangs at them in a beatific smile as they gave their thanks, leaving the three pack members quiet in shock.

Teresa smiled at them and nudged Jean Luc as he sniggered at their surprise, "She a Vampire, luvs, not exactly a rare creature. But then again you've all been so sheltered in that little town, haven't you?"

Lydia's eyes narrowed, "Sheltered? We've fought hunters, figured out and fixed why Jackson was being controlled as a Kanima, fought of and won against the Alpha Pack. What more besides Vampires and whatever Stiles is do we have to know about before we're not considered sheltered?"

Jean Luc raised a rather imperial eyebrow at her, "Whatever Stiles is? According to him, you're the smartest of the entire Beacon Hills Pack and you haven't at least hazarded a guess, miss? On behalf of magic users everywhere, I am insulted."

Lydia's face transformed into a vicious scowl, her anger palpable to everyone near them, "Well pardon me, sir, for not feeling accurate enough to assume that my research and hypothesizes were immediately correct. I haven't exactly had a chance to confirm any of them considering my prey hasn't exactly been available for questioning and I'm only basing my research on second hand accounts."

Danny was the one to halt the vitriol that was about to spill from Lydia's rouge painted lips before the impromptu meeting got any more inflammatory. 

"Alright, everyone, let's all calm down and restart this whole thing, shall we? Stile's knows us already, and apparently so does his cousin, but I'm Danny Mahelani and that’s Jackson Whittemore and Lydia Martin. And you all are?"

Stiles cleared his throat and pointed to each person, "The walnut haired woman next to me is my cousin, Annalise but I call her Harley. The blond is Teresa and the man beside her is her fiancé, Jean Luc. Their old friends Harl made in college and they've . . . Kinda taken a liking to me."

It was Jackson who spoke this time, his voice flat. 

"They've taken a liking to you. Right, that completely explains why you were basically fucking on the dance floor. I suppose there is no accounting for taste."

Annalise chuckled, "I guess not, but too each their own, yes?"

"Hey!"

Everyone chuckled, the three pack members somewhat awkwardly.

It was Teresa that leaned back against her fiance's shoulder and spoke, "What exactly is you hypothesis, Ms. Martin?"

"Lydia. At first I thought he was something of a specter or poltergeist, fooling us all into believing he was alive but there was no evidence to back up that theory. Maybe a demon had possessed him and was using his body. However, despite him avoiding us there were no murders, nothing overly heinous happening in Beacon Hills or the surrounding towns, it just didn't fit. Then, well, then Allison and I were doing a bit of research going through her father's bestiaries when he walked in on us. He didn't even say anything he just looked at us and sighed before pulling a tome closer and flipping through it. When he got to what he was looking for he pushed it towards us and left."

A moue fitted itself onto her lips as her brows furrowed, "Unfortunately the entry he presented to us, while making sense, also stated that this being was a myth among myths, something only speculated about. It had a list of what they were known by, but there at the bottom was a hand written entry. Allison confirmed it was her dad's hand writing, though how he found this new name we aren't sure.

"It was Shades, the Liberis Mors Mortis, Children of Death or Death's Children, take your pick."

She finished talking, looking at Stiles the entire time, her eyes boring into him.

"We're good at hiding, most of the time, but Mr. Argent had the unfortunate chance of seeing Ace in a rather bad mood. It's probably a good thing though; it made the man think it looks like."

Lydia's eyes shot to Annalise, her eyes wide but it was Danny that asked, "We?"

Teresa answered this time, "Just Anna, me, and Stiles tonight. Luc is a caster."

Lydia's voice was sharp, hearing that, pointed and meant to draw metaphorical blood, "So it's all true, living in between life and death, seeing them, being able to be with people even after they're dead? Why are you so sensitive about your mother then?"

"People pass on there, just as they do here, Lydia. And there are some things that can hurt us just like wolfsbane hurts a were. Mom left both worlds at the same time, to where people go when their ready, I guess."

The strawberry blond deflated in her seat a little, not expecting the flat monotone voice that had come out of her normally excitable friend and considered him for a moment.

His eyes had changed while he spoke, staring off into a distance unseen to her, slitted and green like a cats and she thinks it's no wonder he's always fighting and snarking at Derek if they're from different suborders of Carnivora.

She can't help but cock her head to the side as she asks, "Are your animal halves genetic or is each person different?"

Stiles blinks myopically at her as Teresa and Jean Luc start laughing and Annalise chuckles into her hand, Stiles' blank face morphing into a grin at her as Danny and Jackson look at her like she's nuts.

Danny asks the question her male bookends are thinking, "What the hell do you mean, animal half, Lyds?"

She shrugs and folds her arms across her chest, flicking her hair behind her, "Shades are supposed to have an animal half, almost like a werewolf or a Kanima, in order to help protect themselves and their charges."

Teresa answers her finally, once more in control of herself, "Well considering Ann is a Belcher's Sea Snake, Stiles is a Clouded Leopard, his mother was a Brazilian Wandering Spider, and I'm a Spotted Hyena, I'd say no."

Lydia 'hmm'd' and proceeded to ponder what she'd just learned, "So family has nothing to do with what animal you are?"

All three Shade's shook their head 'no.'

"Why haven't you told any of us? C'mon Stilinski, it's not like everyone would hate you for it considering most of us are animals too."

Stiles grimaced at Jackson's words, trying to figure out how to explain it when Jean Luc interrupts.

"Think for a second, Scales, what would your Alpha do to him, as reactionary as he is, when he learns that Stiles' can see, hear, talk, and interact with his family, all of whom are _deceased_ , while he himself can't."

Jackson scowls at the nickname but doesn't say anything as he thinks about the other man's words.

"He'd probably do more than just threaten to rip out Stiles' throat out with his teeth," is Danny's soft reply.

Teresa nods, "Yeah, and besides, do you know how awkward it is to tell someone you were just having lunch with a person that's been dead close to five years? Ten? _Over a hundred?_ Especially when that person has no real concept of talking to those in the afterlife or that there is an actual afterlife."

Lydia is the one to ask the next question, "Then why did you tell your fiancé about being a Shade, surely that had to have been hard."

"I come from down near the bayou, Lydia, Voodoo and Hoodoo both make use of speakin' with the spirits so talking with the dead isn't unnatural to me. Learning that my girl could go visit the dead? It took a bit getting used to but it wasn't world changing like y'all are finding it to be."

Danny's head was cocked to the side as he listened to the talking around him, his soft voice drawing everyone's attention to him when he asked the damning question Stiles knew would come up eventually.

"You've talked with her, haven't you? Derek's sister, Laura."

Stiles grimaced as he though back to the beginning of the inclusion of werewolves in his life, "Only after both halves of her were buried together outside of the mountain ash circle. From what my research has told me, Derek burying half of her surrounded by that kept her from fully materializing in the Fade, the world of the Dead. And the rest of his family didn't know much about what was possibly happening here."

Lydia swallowed heavily, "So you didn't really learn anything until after we had killed Peter, everything before that was guess work and from your own experiences."

Stiles nodded with a quiet 'yeah.'

The seven of them were silent for several moments before a beautiful young man with almost translucent blue hair, shimmering pale green skin, and pointed ears coalesced next to the table from a wispy mist. Danny gasped as he looked into eyes that looked like the surface of the sea, ripples and waves moving throughout the pools as he blinked charmingly at them.

His voice was quiet and gentle like water lapping softly at a beach, "Hello, is there anything I can get for you? Or would you like more time to think?"

"I think most of us are still thinking, but could I have a cup of Druid's Tongue? Maybe bring a whole pot over?"

Lydia looked almost scandalized as she stared at Jena Luc, "Druid's Tongue?"

He smiled at her, "I'll let you try some."

Annalise and Teresa both huffed a laugh at them as Stiles order for the three of them and gestured to his pack members as an afterthought, "We'll have Naga Venom, and they'll have some human-safe drinks, probably soda or some alcohol."

Jackson scowled at Stiles as Danny continued blinking at the young man before them, "Yeah, we'll have iced tea or soda if you have it."

Their server smiled and disappeared just as he had come, vanishing into a mist.

Danny swallowed again, "What—ah—what exactly was he?"

"He's a Nyx, a water spirit. Of course if you look up the myth, they'll be completely different from him but humans of old rarely recorded the truth, just what they thought was happening or the very surface of what they'd seen."

"Oh." Danny looked around the room, watching as the man served other tables the same way had had come to them, even holding peoples food and drinks as he misted his way around the restaurant. 

Lydia was now watching the people around them, taking in the different colored skin, tusks and teeth, wild hair and extra appendages, and the complimentary fashions changed slightly to fit tails or wings. They were people, mythical beings and nightmares or fantasies, but still people living in the modern world.

"How could everyone not notice them; _us?_ "

Annalise was the one to speak next, her voice soft and sad, her black eyes watching the entire room.

"Because humans have always feared that which is different and throughout time and history we've all been vilified or misrepresented because they never stop to really know us, just look at us in scream in horror and call for our deaths. It's an argument they make in the X-men, humans fear what they don't understand, because it's true. People discriminate because of race and religion, why not a person's species or abilities? 

"So we stick to the shadows, make anyone who's found out and not accepted us forget or make it so they can't _prove_ we exist. There are always other worlds hidden in the one you know, you just have to look for them, look in the shadows of society and accept them or your doomed to forget or regret it."


	5. Stick and Stones

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Not a one of them is well adjusted, never think that.
> 
> Its probably why the truth hurts as much as it _is_ the Truth.
> 
> But maybe they'll be able to work with it, be able to take that truth and learn from it, instead of just leaving the wounds to fester.

Stiles was quite relaxed, perching on a far reaching flag pole that was attached to the building Danny's older brother lived in. He was lounging lengthwise along it for a nap, much to Danny and Jackson's disbelief, while Lydia picked Jean Luc's brain about the types of Magicks available to humans.

Stiles was lethargically staring up at the sky, listening to the active world around him, cars driving past stories below him and the faint laughter of young party goers and revelers drifting on the wind, they were close enough to the bay that he could smell salt from the sea along with asphalt and rubber from the roads. The drinks and the dancing had loosened him up but the Naga Venom from the diner had begun to move through his system and his limbs felt heavy and relaxed in a way he hadn't felt in a long while.

He almost felt bad, partly for leaving his older family to answer his younger Pack's questions and partly for not being able to even muster up the desire to explain it to them himself after Lydia's interrogation.

The elder Mahelani's place was closer than where he and Harl had been staying with Teresa and Jean Luc so they'd went there after eating and discussing some of the more acceptable topics about the giant monster in the room.

Lydia had dragged him behind the others, Jackson and Danny peppering the others with questions as the more assertive girl targeted their Pack mate's soft spots and pulled out what they really wanted to know.

Why was he with Teresa and Jean Luc? It's Statutory.

Stiles had been quiet until her questions got too barbed and by that point they were so far behind the others not even Jackson could have heard their conversation.

He couldn't keep it from replaying over and over again in his head, the points she'd made and how horribly he'd explained why they were the way they were and his relationship with the other two.

_"What is going on Stile's? Your Dad is the Sheriff of Beacon Hills; do you really think he would be ok with you being in a relationship with one person that's almost ten years older than you, let alone two?"_

_"It's fine Lydia. He knows, hell he's met them and understands."_

_"Understands? How the hell can he accept you dating two people almost a decade older than you? How can you expect us too? Especially Derek, when you know what Kate did to get to the Hale family."_

_"Age is nothing but a number, the only difference you get from a larger one is more experience."_

_"Oh, and your experience puts you on par with the decade more that the two of them have?"_

_"No, my experience puts me ahead of what happened between Derek and Kate."_

_"This isn't about what happened with them, this is about you and how dangerous it is being in a relationship between two dramatically older people!"_

_"They're both twenty-three! That’s only six years Lydia not twenty, not ten, six! And being what we are six years is nothing!"_

_"Nothing? Nothing! Do you know what a six years difference between you and them can do? And just because you're a Shade doesn't mean you have the equivalent of an adult's experience!"_

_"It does when you've seen death since before you could understand that being grey means that a person's dead! Seen the cruelty another person can do to another or the means a person will go through to get to the end!"_

_"And how do you know they won't hurt you?"_

_"I don't! That’s part of being in a relationship! You hurt each other; the difference is whether or not you meant to hurt the other person and if you try to make it up to them when you do!"_

_How can you let yourself be out there like that? Give them the power to destroy you?!"_

_"Because that's Love! Are they my soul mates, the ones that will be my forever and ever? No, probably not, but at least I have the guts to try unlike you and Jackson!"_

_"And what's that supposed to mean?"_

_"You know exactly what it means, Lydia, it means you're both to chickenshit to fess up that you're probably genius level smart and he's still insecure about why he even had to be adopted in the first place!"_

_"At least I'm not the one deathly afraid that they're going to lose another parent to the point of smothering them!"_

They'd both gone quiet after that, screamed words wounding both of them and the friendship they'd been building since the whole werewolf mess started. By the time they caught up to the others at the Mahelani place, everyone could tell something had happened because Lydia's rouge painted lips were pressed together so tight they were white through the makeup and Stile's was more animal than human in his mannerisms. The others were quiet as they went up to the penthouse, the tension palpable to even the strangers getting into the elevator car with them.

Stiles had slunk out of the car first looking through any visible windows of the suite he could until he found one with something he could lay along outside of the building, he'd gone out and almost flopped down on it before anyone could say anything.

Danny's soft voice startled him, he'd been so focused on the conversation before and listening to life going on around and under him that he hadn't noticed the darker skinned teen.

"She's just worried, you know. She's not quite sure how exactly to handle all of this, all the secrets. To her, you're supposed to be the most transparent of us all, spastic and always saying whatever goes through your head. You've been trailing after her forever, seeing you in such a dangerous relationship scares her."

"They won't hurt me."

"How can you be so sure? You thought Derek was a murderer and he's not, how do you know they won't hurt you?"

"I didn't know Derek before that."

"And you know them?"

"Since before my mother died. Anna's dad, my mom's brother died of cancer when I was around five, mom taught us both the same things and when mom died we stuck together. She met Teresa when I was about eight, so I've known her for close to half my life Danny. I've known Jean Luc the least but I know he not like Kate, nothing what so ever like her."

"We just want you safe. We don't know them and I guess we just don't know how to accept them as your choice just yet."

"I don't know if they're my forever, Danny, just that they're my now. They don't care about my quirks and can calm me down when I'm over stimulated and wired or angry beyond belief. I know me being with them is new but . . . They ground me when I'm about to get lost and forget there is a different between life and death."

"If you're that sure, then I guess we should really get to know you partners, even if they do live almost five hours away."

"That's what Skype and the phone is for."

Danny's laughter caught the others attention and Lydia couldn't help but let some of the tension from their earlier argument melt.

If Danny was laughing, especially after pulling answers out of Stiles, then they should be okay.

Hopefully.


End file.
